Humpback Whales: the full behavioural works off Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

What sort of whale watching were we in for we wondered when we landed at Puerto Vallarta on the Pacific Coast of Mexico. We went out into Banderas Bay on two consecutive mornings and found out. It was not the usual sightings of whales ploughing through the sea and then diving ‘tail-up’. This was the full works, especially on the second morning. The Humpbacks (Megaptera novaeangliae) are in the bay from December until March. That population moves north to feed in the Pacific between Russia and North America.

Female Humpbacks and their newly-born young stay in the shallow water at the north end of the bay. Males hang about waiting for the females, with young in tow, to move out of the shallows when coming into their first oestrus post partum. A female may have a pretty permanent male ‘escort’ who may or may not strike it lucky if he can outdo the band of pursuing, barging males.

We saw the males do the full range of their behavioural repertoire from slapping the surface of the water with their fins or tail, flapping water sideways with their tail and breaching. Our breaching count went up rapidly from one (out of the blue before breakfast while anchored off Pitcairn island near the site of the remains of HMS Bounty in 2010) to what must have been more than ten.

There are all sorts of explanations for male Humpbacks breach, from display to shifting skin parasites. My impression—which may be entirely wrong—is that we were witnessing a gigantic aquatic lek within hearing and sight of the females, including those in the shallow water. In other words, my splash is noisier and thus bigger than his so I am the best hope for you to pass on your genes this time round. Oh, and look at how strong my fins are.

We saw one male emerge from the water and snapping its mouth shut as if feeding (see the video below). There have been occasions when the humpbacks have been seen feeding on shoals of small fish in Banderas Bay but in general they live, and the females lactate, using only stored fat and protein. 

We moved to quieter water in highly recommended the Ecotours boat Prince of Whales for the hydrophone to pick up the song of the males. You can hear some of that and see the whales in the video below. After seeing the males flopping back into the water after virtually the whole body had risen out of it, and imagining the effect it would have had on bone and muscle, there was the suggestion from the gentlemen on board that is was no wonder whales wail.

After whales, dolphins, birds nesting on islands in the bay it was off to lunch and birdwatching in the afternoon.

A band of White-nosed Coatis in Mexico

Shortly after crossing the 470 metre long suspension bridge at El Jorullo a few miles inland from Puerto Vallarta on the Pacific Coast of Mexico a small café on the forest track comes into view. Standing outside for a few minutes to see if the noisy Military Macaws would come into view, a group of White-nosed Coatis (Nasua narica) appeared, obviously wondering if we were going to have something to eat and give into their entreaties for a few scraps from the table. Having just had lunch we weren’t but they tried their luck for a while before disappearing back into the forest of Canopy River Park. Members of the Carnivora they may be but these, like other members of the procyonid family, like raccoons, are very much omnivorous.

Except in the breeding season, the bands are said to comprise only females and juveniles, the make leading a solitary existence. They are diurnal.

White-nosed coatis are very much a species of Central America, occurring from parts of Arizona and New Mexico in the north to the very tip of Colombia in the south.

Herons in the Mangroves: Mexico in February

Rio La Tovara near San Blas on the Pacific Coast of Mexico

On our last day before leaving Mexico we had a boat trip at 4 pm which took us from our hotel in San Blas first to the mouth of the Rio Arroyo Grande and then through the mangroves lining the narrow Rio La Tovara. Night fell as cruised upstream and we returned in the dark. On the way out we saw a number of birds in the mangroves, including the three species of heron shown below. Even in daylight it was dark under the mangroves.

   This Tricolored Heron Egretta tricolor was moving slowly on the lookout for fish

  Green Heron Butorides virescens also on the hunt

  Boat-billed Heron Cochlearius cochlearius. One of a small group.
They often feed by night and eat anything that moves, from mammals to shrimps

As darkness fell Snowy (Egretta thula) and Great (Ardea alba) Egrets were gathered to roost

Seeing the aptly named Boat-billed Herons was appropriate seeing we were staying at a hotel—an excellent hotel—with the same name: the Garza Canela.

A Good Summer for Garden Butterflies

 Small Copper Lycaena phlaeas

Painted Lady Vanessa cardui

Small Tortoiseshell Aglais urticae

Red Admiral Vanessa atalanta

The stars of the show this year with up to seven in the garden at any one time. Feeding on nectar and then the fallen over-ripe plums.

Life at the Top 3: Southern Rock Hyrax on Table Mountain, South Africa. Life on the Edge

Tourists on Table Mountain may miss the mammalian interest simply because they spend so much time looking at the views that they forget the rocks below their eyeline. On those rocks, often only inches from the edge, are groups of Rock Hyrax (Procavia capensis) doing what hyraxes do best and for a long time—lying in the sun, interrupted only by playful young, itches that have to be scratched and overhead large predators. If South Africans spot them they will immediately call them 'dassies' because that's what they call hyraxes in southern Africa.

Everybody knows that hyraxes are most closely related to elephants but they are fascinating animals for all sorts of reasons. Some features like their feet are obvious.They have sweat glands on the soles such that they are tacky when climbing. The soles of their front feet touch the ground when walking; in other words they are plantigrade. The heels of the hind feet are raised slightly off the ground when walking. This semi-digitigrade condition is one which provides some spring to their step when moving on rocks.

Other features are not so obvious. The generic name, procavia, was derived from cavy (i.e. guinea-pig), early taxonomists considering them some primitive form of the South American rodents. Apart from appearance they do share some characteristics with cavies: a long gestation (very long in the hyrax, 6-7 months); young are mature at birth, able to run around and soon eating solid food. They also have peculiarities during pregnancy. In most mammals, the hormone progesterone increases in concentration in blood as pregnancy progresses; in hyraxes it does not, the blood itself metabolising the hormone into different compounds. Two of my former colleagues did that research in the 1970s. That raises all sorts of questions as to what induces parturition and the onset of lactation in hyraxes.

Grey [now Long-tailed] Sibia: a colour plate from 1937

In the days when colour printing was extremely expensive, the Avicultural Society had special appeals for funds to support the appearance in Avicultural Magazine of the occasional colour plate. A well-known bird artist was then commissioned. Although the whole run of the Society’s magazines can be found online, the plates rarely see the light of day. Therefore I decided to show one, now and again, on this site. This is the 22nd in the series.

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The plate bore the signature of M. Dovaston. That can only be Margaret Isabel Dovaston (1884-1954) although the subject was far from that for which she is best known—oil paintings of historical English interior scenes depicting groups of figures from the 18th century. She produced these in considerable numbers which together with prints sold particularly well in North America. They became popular decorative art for living rooms. Originals still sell well, with up to US$44,000 recorded. She had a studio in Acton. She was educated at South Kensington School of Art and the Royal Academy Schools. A clue that she must be the artist of the plate in Avicultural Magazine is that she kept budgerigars and other birds. She was not a member of the Avicultural Society and this is the only painting by her I can find in Avicultural Magazine.

The article accompanying this plate was written by Albert Sherriff (1895-1968), a stockbroker living in Hampstead, who earlier in the century had changed his name from Sondheim. Sherriff had also donated the plate which suggests he commissioned Miss Dovaston to paint the sibias. He wrote:

The Grey Sibias, so well portrayed on the opposite page by Miss Dovaston, are new to aviculture. They were imported from Sumatra by Mr. Frost in the early part of 1936. They are about the size of a Shama with an equally long tail which is barred with white on the underside.

Early last year I gave two of these Sibias an aviary to themselves, and was fortunate enough to find that they were a true pair as there is no apparent sex difference. A nest was built in the fork of a tree in which two blue eggs, similar in size to those of a Blackbird, were laid. After sixteen days the young were hatched and were well cared for by the parents.

Unfortunately, three days later, I decided to try the same experiment with the Grey Sibias as had been so successful with the Black-headed, and allowed them liberty. The second night after, the cock forsook the aviary and disappeared…

Because it was very difficult to provide enough small invertebrates for birds in captivity to rear their young successfully, it was common practice for birdkeepers to open their aviary doors and allow birds to forage for themselves in the neighbourhood. Local sparrowhawks and cats were often the grateful recipients of easily-caught and unexpected meals.

Wilfred Frost was a well-known collector in south-east Asia about whom a book could and should be written. He sold his birds to zoos and wealthy collectors like Sherriff.

Both common and scientific names have been changed since 1937. The birds from Sumatra have been 'lumped' and are now regarded as a subspecies of Heterophasia picaoides, H. p. simillima. The Long-tailed Sibia occurs from Nepal and south-western China through south-east Asia to Sumatra.

Richardson’s Ground Squirrels: in the news and in excess

Richardson's Ground Squirrel or Flickertail
Minot, North Dakota 2023

In 2023 I described how we had seen the Flickertail or Richardson’s Ground Squirrel (Urocitellus richardsonii) when we were in North Dakota earlier that year. We were staying at a hotel in Minot, around 50 miles from the Canadian border. Spotting the ground squirrels was easy. They were in the mowed grass bank directly in front of the hotel.

One morning we headed north to the Upper Soris Wildlife Reserve and passed the main gate of Minot Air Force base. Later as we drove south to Bismarck and an excellent dinner, a Boeing B52 flew in low from the south and passed directly overhead towards the base.l Minot is home to a B52 bomb group, an aeroplane that entered service in the year I left primary school. I can even remember the excitement of the boys in the school playground at the hope of seeing the new Stratofortress. It only took 49 years.

However, I was amused to see that Minot Air Force Base was in the news earlier this year because the whole place is being over-run with Dak-Rats i.e. Dakota Rats, as these ground squirrels are called in the base. The US Air Force was suggesting that not only do they spread disease but their tunnelling undermines housing, runways and other equipment. 

And it not just the air base that is concerned, the 48,000 inhabitants of the city of Minot are also complaining about the increase in numbers and the problems the ground squirrels cause. They are being shot, trapped and gassed with carbon monoxide in their thousands. And we thought ourselves lucky to spot a few next to the hotel. No wonder though that North Dakota has the nickname ‘Flickertail State’.